


Five People Who Heard the Bantha Story

by cantarina, reena_jenkins



Series: A Little Less Attitude and a Little More Altitude [18]
Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars: Rebels
Genre: 5 Times, Family History, Gen, Oral History, Podfic, Podfic Collaboration, Podfic Length: 0-10 Minutes, Reena Jenkins made me do it, Remix, Space family, Spoilers for season 4 finale, Storytelling, TODAY IS MY 8TH PODFICIVERSARY!, Team as Family, oral tradition
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-08-11
Updated: 2018-08-11
Packaged: 2019-06-22 13:54:01
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,423
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15583416
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/cantarina/pseuds/cantarina, https://archiveofourown.org/users/reena_jenkins/pseuds/reena_jenkins
Summary: A remix of ShannonPhillips's "The Milk Run", as retold through the years to the crew of the Ghost.





	Five People Who Heard the Bantha Story

**Author's Note:**

  * Inspired by [The Milk Run](https://archiveofourown.org/works/7154924) by [ShannonPhillips](https://archiveofourown.org/users/ShannonPhillips/pseuds/ShannonPhillips). 
  * Inspired by [[podfic] The Milk Run](https://archiveofourown.org/works/15543021) by [reena_jenkins](https://archiveofourown.org/users/reena_jenkins/pseuds/reena_jenkins), [ShannonPhillips](https://archiveofourown.org/users/ShannonPhillips/pseuds/ShannonPhillips). 



**Coverartist:** reena_jenkins

 **Length:** 00:11:38

[ **MOBILE STREAMING LINK | 8.9 MB** ](http://reena.parakaproductions.com/podfics/\(SW\)%20_Five%20People%20Who%20Heard%20the%20Bantha%20Story_.mp3)

[ **DOWNLOAD MP3 (RIGHT-CLICK, SAVE-AS)** ](http://reena.parakaproductions.com/podfics/\(SW\)%20_Five%20People%20Who%20Heard%20the%20Bantha%20Story_.mp3)

 

"So then he says, five fathiers and a taunton."

It was a really good night Hera thought, watching her crew laugh long and loud at the punchline of Zeb's story. They had finished a questionably legal cargo run earlier in the day, and were docked for repairs an equally questionable spaceport waiting their next job.

Even Sabine had joined them tonight. She'd only been aboard the Ghost for a few weeks but had already proven herself as a valuable field agent. As a travel companion though, she was still closed off and guarded, never rude, but never spending more time with them than was strictly polite. Hera hadn't been sure she'd stay until three days ago, when Sabine had awkwardly asked if Hera wouldn't mind if she painted her room. Hera was itching to get a look at what was happening in there, but was biding her time, waiting for an invitation.

As they started to settle down, Hera shot a warm, smug look at Kanan. "You should tell them about the milk run."

"No, no way," he said. "I'm still trying to forget that job."

"The milk run?" said Sabine, from where she was cleaning her weapon on the far side of the small table. "Is that code for something?"

Hera smiled and shook her head. "More like an in-joke. It was one of the earlier jobs Kanan and I took together."

"It was a disaster. We're lucky we got out of it in one piece with the cargo intact," said Kanan, affecting grumpiness, but Hera knew him well enough by now to know he was warming to the memory.

"We were flat broke," Hera said.

"Situation as normal, then," said Zeb, interrupting, and Kanan punched him lightly on the arm. Hera started again.

"We were flat broke, as usual, so I found us a run that would keep us going for a while longer."

Kanan rolled his eyes. "She told me we were transporting someone important from Raydonia to Taanab."

"Well, we were."

"Wait," Sabine said, and Hera’s heart leapt as Sabine put down her gun and turned her whole attention toward them. "You said cargo earlier."

Kanan sighed, put-upon. "She's getting to that."

Hera took them through meeting Elsie, glossing over the worst details of their capture by the Rhodian pirates, though they all knew that Zeb and Sabine had a pretty good idea of what that kind of situation looked like. She told them about how she'd claimed to be a bratty dignitary's daughter to get them out of the cell, and Kanan nudged his foot with hers when she left out her father's name and let them assume it was all a lie.

"So there I am, I've finally programmed the ship to feed too much power back into the stabilizers and tractors so that the Ghost can break free and their ship is dead in the water, and I'm wondering how in the worlds we're going to fight our way past all of those Rhodians, when in comes Kanan - "

The ship rocked suddenly, and there was a long, silent moment where they all braced to see if another wave was coming.

"Everybody to your stations," Hera said. "Chop, what was that?"

As they split up, Zeb and Kanan already heading for the gun turrets, Hera and Sabine toward the cockpit, Hera sighed. "We were having such a nice night too."

***

Chopper and Ezra were in the common area when Kanan walked in, laughing over a projection.

"Chop, how did you even get that?" Kanan said as soon as he recognized it.

The little astromech laughed, waving his arms in the air, before trundling out of the room more smugly than a droid should have been able to. He was lucky Kanan didn't scrap him.

"Kanan," said Ezra, eyes wide. "Why didn't you TELL me about this? This is the single greatest thing you've ever done."

Kanan crossed his arms. "I hope that's not true. I hope I've done more important things than ride a Bantha out of a bad situation."

Ezra started at him. "Kanan. You rode a Bantha. Into battle. And WON."

Kanan sighed, long and deep.

***

 

They were crouched behind a row of shipping containers, blaster bolts flying over their heads.

"Kanan and Hera ever tell you about the milk run?" Zeb said to Rex, who was firing his blaster back the way they'd come.

"Is now really the time?" said Kanan, deflecting a lucky shot back toward the Stormtroopers.

"Always a bit of time for levity, Commander," said Rex, dropping two Imps in quick succession.

"Is this story ever going to die?" said Kanan, wishing desperately that it would.

"I hope not!" said Ezra, grinning cheerfully.

***

Hera was putting Jacen to sleep when the door chimed.

“Someone’s here, Mom!” he said, popping back upright about as quickly as Hera had expected him to.

She sighed, but there was no use for it now. “C’mon, _ma sareen_. Let’s see who it is.”

Jacen hopped out of a bed, taking off at a dead run for the door to their quarters. He had to be tired - she certainly was - but Jacen was always as likely to fall asleep leaning against a door waiting on her, in the fresher, or even mid-step, as he was in bed. She let him go, not worried about who might be knocking at their door deep inside the Yavin 4 base.

“Uncle Zeb!” she heard as she walked out of Jacen’s small bedroom, just in time to see Jacen launch himself at Zeb. He caught him easily, swinging Jacen up over his head. Laughter filled the room.

“I’d appreciate it if you didn’t get him so riled up at bedtime,” Hera said, but she wasn’t angry. Zeb and Kallus had been offworld for weeks and it was good to see them.

“I heard it was someone’s birthday last week,” said Zeb, kneeling as he set Jacen back down on the ground. Even so, he loomed large over Jacen, but neither of them seemed to mind. Hera looked over at Kallus in hello and she saw the warmth she knew was in her expression there too.  
“I got a model Y wing!” said Jacen

“It was a gift from Wedge,” said Hera, putting a hand in Jacen’s hair. “Never too early to get them interested in flying.”

“With you as his mother,” Kallus said, “I doubt that was ever in any danger.”

“Hey, he might have taken after his father,” she said. It wasn’t so painful to talk about Kanan, these days.

“He should be so lucky,” said Zeb, sincere as she’d ever heard him. Hera squeezed his arm affectionately, drawing him up.

“Come on in. I was putting Jacen to bed, but we can make an exception for the best uncles in the galaxy.”

Jacen cheered and took hold of Kallus and Zeb’s tunics, tugging them toward the sitting area. They smiled fondly at each other over Jacen’s head, and Hera thought, again, that they’d be good parents some day, if they decided they wanted that for themselves.

“Uncle Zeb, Uncle Alexsandr, will you tell me a story about dad?”

“Well,” said Kallus, “you do have your father sense of timing. Here.” He said, holding out a lumpy package he’d been holding under one arm. “Happy belated birthday.”

Jacen whooped and then threw himself bodily at the gift, tearing into the paper.

“What do you say when someone brings you a -” Hera said, but stopped dead in her tracks when Jacen pulled a stuffed bantha toy from the wreckage of the wrapping paper.

“You didn’t,” said Hera, barely holding back laughter.

“My only regret is that it’s not big enough to ride,” said Zeb solemnly.

“I guess you were in on this too?” Hera said to Kallus.

“Oh, I assure you, the incident in full has been relayed to me.”

“Well then, I guess we’d better fill in Jacen.” Hera turned to her son, who was prancing the bantha along the floor. “Jacen, honey, would you like to hear a story about me, your dad and a bantha named Elsewise Sky’s-the-Limit? After that it’s time for bed.”

Kanan would have been complaining if he’d been here, but he’d have wrapped his arm around Hera’s waist and pulled her close, and told the story to their son.

“A story about dad?” Jacen said, finally looking up.

“You bet,” said Hera, and started in on the telling.

**Author's Note:**

> WOW OKAY. I'm pretty sure this story happened when reena_jenkins sent me her recording of "The Milk Run" on the heels of a bad day I was having, and then I typed the first three scenes into her Twitter DMs while she was asleep. I should probably have predicted she'd record those words too.
> 
> Beta'd by the excellent isweedan. High five to Shannon Phillips for having blanket permission.


End file.
